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For the past three years I have been fortunate enough to attend SXSW. It’s kind of like summer camp when you think about it. In many cases (and mine) you are staying with friends, sometimes too many for the apartment you are in, you see people you haven’t seen in a year and you run around like kids going to see the next big thing, an artist you’ve been dying to see and bands/musicians who are playing massive underplays. All in, SXSW is what you make of it and this past year was no exception. Of course I didn’t get to see everyone I had hoped to but I did have a handful of new discoveries and a grip of new memories to carry with me.
In five days I logged 63 miles on my feet traversing the city and it was worth every step.

Who I saw:

Monday: The Vaccines, Ryan Hemsworth, Run The Jewels, Kaleo, Cathedrals, Spoon and Portugal. The Man

There were hands down an overabundance of great performances but for me the best shows of the week were Leon Bridges, The Delta Riggs, The War On Drugs and Future Islands.

Yes I saw Run The Jewels where the fight broke out. The show was packed with energy and too much fn besides that brief interruption.

Seeing Frank Turner acoustic on the back patio of Red7 with maybe 100 people was a true treat.

Wyclef as always delivered a fun and crowd participation show well worth the wait.

Skylar Spence (FKA Saint Pepsi) is putting together a band for this summer’s festival season so be on the lookout for that!

If you have a chance to see the California Honeydrops, do it!Robert DeLong keeps getting better and better.

San Fermin, my how much this band has grown in a year. Sounding excellent.

I became a fan of Sam Hunt.

Kaleo sound nothing like you’d expect and that’s a good thing.

Spoon was ripping through shows all week and sounded great as expected but I can’t wait for Britt Daniel to go back out as Divine Fits.

Jack Ladder, seek them out this year.

Despite saying it was their last song, anyone who stayed for The War On Drugs show at YouTube was treated to 30 more minutes of rip roaring jamming and it was flat out crushing!

I’d been dying to see George Maple and she lived up to it. Her new track with What So Not, fire!

And again, LEON BRIDGES. I sincerely hope you all start listening to this soulful human being who is going to make his mark this year. If you’re lucky enough to catch Leon and St. Paul and The Broken Bones at the same festival (Outside Lands) these two are quickly ascending to a level of fame that I hope makes them the stars of tomorrow.

A day after releasing “Lifted Up (1985)” the first single off the upcoming album, Kindred, Passion Pit didn’t wait long to drop a second track with the debut of “Where The Sky Hangs.” Pre-ordering the album was made available today as well.

One of the albums I’m most excited about in 2015 is Kindred from Passion Pit and today the band released the single “Lifted Up (1985).” As a follow-up to the acclaimed albums Gossamer and Manners, Kindred will be released on April 21 with heavy anticipation from starving fans. Plus the band begins touring next month playing a handful of festivals and what I suspect will soon follow, an announcement for a summer/fall tour too.

Brand new music this afternoon as Madeon and Passion Pit team up for “Pay No Mind.” 2015 is poised to be a big year for both as Madeon gets set to release his debut album, Adventure, in March while Passion Pit are back with their new album, Kindred, in April.

Oh man, just 24 hours from the 2014 Life is Beautiful lineup! I cannot wait to share this year’s lineup with everyone. Each minute we get closer to releasing it the more excited I get. I hope my enthusiasm and love for the talent assembled for year two of the festival is shared by you as well after tomorrow. I hope that as you watch this video below which recaps the music portion of Life is Beautiful 2013, you get pumped to create a whole new set of beautiful memories that will last a lifetime.

“A music festival is a gathering of a lot of strangers but I must say that music by the end of the night it always makes me feel like I know everybody that I shared that experience with and there’s nothing else in the world that can do that like music.” – Dan Reynolds, Imagine Dragons atLife is Beautiful Festival

Finally got a chance to put together a little playlist for this month. Lots and lots of new releases recently so hopefully you like this collection which includes a few tracks from Life is Beautiful performers.

Well it came and went and now the countdown to Life is Beautiful 2014 is underway. Wow, what a wild year 2013 has been. I don’t know if I can yet fully put into words just exactly what the last 12 months have been like but to go from this idea of a four festival in one weekend to actually seeing it come to life and people having the best weekend ever was truly special. It’s not just the music that stands out to me as the shinning moments but rather the memories of people grinning ear to ear and having the best weekend ever.

It was :

seeing my family come through the gates and out of chance being in front to greet them

witnessing a friend who traveled from London be the first one through the gate

watching some of my best friends in the world rocking out to Capital Cities and me surprising them to finally say hi

people chilling in the secret garden listening to HAIM and scoping out the amazing art murals

a packed group of people gathered waiting for Zarkana to take the street for their performance

people lined up to head into the speaker venues to see some brilliant minds give speeches

Downtown come to life in a way I have never seen before

people finally experiencing this vision we had been talking about

being told thank you by countless supporters

riding the ferris wheel and seeing the footprint from high above

the look on a teenager’s face when we fixed a mistake he made when trying to purchase a ticket to the festival

seeing a community come together

running into friends at the El Cortez after party raving about day one and the excitement for day two

hearing all the comments about the great food there was to eat

seeing artists like Zio Ziegler, D*Face, Bicicleta Sem Freio, Doze Green, Ana Marietta, etc. have their art work taken in by thousands of eyes

meeting a father and daughter on Sunday morning at The Beat and hearing about their different experiences at the festival on day one and how thankful they were to have made the trip

waking up on festival morning realizing that we were about to do something special

watching people with 3-D glasses check out an amazing mural by Las Vegas artists

seeing the best Vampire Weekend show I’ve ever seen

looking at the joy on the faces of the Mystere characters backstage after just performing “Radioactive” with Imagine Dragons

bringing friends into FOH to catch a couple shows which I know made their experience that much more special

riding a bicycle around the festival footprint when nobody was on it

Dawes performing at Grills & Guitars

hearing about the performances from Robert DeLong, STS9, Big Gigantic, Poolside, Cosmic Suckerpunch from friends who’d never listened to those artists and be blown away

the crowd of people lined up outside of Insert Coin(s) waiting for their limited edition New Era Life is Beautiful hat and a pop up performance by F. Stokes

seeing the Red Bull Tour Bus pull into the festival grounds and a realize that program we dreamed of come to life

witnessing Michael Jackson ONE on the Downtown Stage

bass face

all my people in the box office and credential trailer, thank you!

the good vibes that came from listening to Omar

Team Bacon & Eggs

YB

Nok Hockey

our “let’s have a fucking festival” t-shirts

the countless hugs and high fives

taking in the Kings of Leon show with my family

learning from the best

a dream come true

sure there were a whole lot more memories but I hope this gives you an idea….

Slowly I’m crawling out of the hole I was and getting a chance to see friends, catch up on life and return to the “real world.” Thank you all for you patience as I at times was unresponsive, non committal and sometimes short. I hope you didn’t take it personal, I was just embarking on an adventure that would consume me. Was it worth it? Every second!

Wow, give a listen to this new version of “Constant Conversations” by Passion Pit. Just in time for their performance at Life is Beautiful! This version as well as a Dillon Francis remix of “Carried Away” and “Ruin Your Day” are on the new Constant Conversations EP which dropped today.

Here we go……just a month away from the inaugural Life is Beautiful Festival in Downtown Las Vegas and now the fun for you can really begin as this morning we released the single day schedules! Give a look and let me know what day and who you’re most excited to see!

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